Christopher Joll - The Speedicut Papers Book 6 (1879–1884): Vitai Lampada

Also by Christopher Joll

Uniquely British: A Year in the Life of the Household Cav alry

The Speedicut Papers Book 1 (1821-1848): Flashmans Se cret

The Speedicut Papers Book 2 (1848-1857): Love & Other Blood Sp orts

The Speedicut Papers Book 3 (1857-1865): Uncivil Wars

The Speedicut Papers Book 4 (1865-1871): Where Eagles Dare

The Speedicut Papers Book 5 (1871-1879): Suffering Be rtie

The Speedicut Papers Book 6 (1879-1884): Vitai Lam pada

The Speedicut Papers Book 7 (1884-1895): Royal Scan dals

The Speedicut Papers Book 8 (1895-1900): At War with Churc hill

The Speedicut Papers Book 9 (1900-1915): Boxing Iceb ergs

THE SPEEDICUT PAPERS
The Memoirs of Jasper Speedicut

Book 6 (18791884)

Vitai Lampada

Edi ted
by

Christopher Joll

AuthorHouse UK

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403 USA

www.authorhouse.co.uk

Phone: 0800.197.4150

2018 Christopher Joll. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 03/29/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9121-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9122-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9120-6 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,
and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

For

NM

Speedicuts second fan

After serving time at Oxford University and the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Christopher Joll spent his formative years as an officer in The Life Guards, an experience from which he has never really recovered.

On leaving the Army, Joll worked first in investment banking, but the boredom of City life led him to switch careers and become an arms salesman. After ten years of dealing with tin pot dictators in faraway countries, he moved - perhaps appropriately - into public relations where, in this new incarnation, he had to deal with dictators of an altogether different type.

From his earliest days, Joll has written articles, features, short stories and reportage. One such piece of writing led to an early brush with notoriety when an article he had penned anonymously in 1974 for a political journal ended up as front page national news and resulted in a Ministerial inquiry. In 2012 Joll wrote the text for Uniquely British: A Year in the Life of the Household Cavalry , an illustrated account of the Household Cavalry from the Royal Wedding to the Diamond Jubilee, and in 2017 he published The Spoils of War . His yet to be published memoires, Anecdotal Evidence , promises to cause considerable consternation in certain quarters should it ever appear in print.

Since leaving the Army in 1975, Joll has been involved in devising and managing charity fund-raising events. This interest started in 1977 with The Silver Jubilee Royal Gifts Exhibition at St Jamess Palace and The Royal Cartoons Exhibition at the Press Club. In subsequent years, he co-produced Jos Carreras & Friends, a one-night Royal Gala Concert at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane; Serenade for a Princess, a Royal Gala Concert at the Banqueting House, Whitehall; and Concert for a Prince, a Royal Gala Concert staged at Windsor Castle (the first such event to be held there following the post-fire restoration).

More recently, Joll has focused on devising, writing, directing and sometimes producing events primarily for military charities. These include in various different roles the Household Cavalry Pageant (2007); the Chelsea Pageant (2008); the Diamond Jubilee Parade in the Park (2012); the British Military Tournament (2010-2013); the Gurkha Bicentenary Pageant (2015); the Waterloo Bicentenary National Service of Commemoration & Parade at St Pauls Cathedral (2015); the Shakespeare 400 Memorial Concert (2016); The Patrons Luncheon (2016), the official London event to mark The Queens 90th Birthday and The Great War Symphony to be premiered in 2018 at the Royal Albert Hall.

With the first publication of The Speedicut Papers in 2013, the reading public was shocked to learn that Brigadier General Sir Harry Flashman VC, one of the greatest heroes of the Victorian age, was nothing more than a Paris-based remittance man and a plagiarising fraud. Almost as shocking was the revelation that, for more than 250 years, there has been a secret organisation at the heart of the British Establishment, called The Brotherhood of the Sons of Thunder, which was ruthlessly interfering in the nations affairs.

These facts were revealed in a cache of letters written over a lifetime by Colonel Sir Jasper Speedicut to his friend Harry Flashman, which I discovered in 2010 in the basement of the New Walk Museum in Leicester. Taken together, the letters are a comprehensive record of the life and times of Speedicut: soldier, courtier, bi-sexual and reluctant hero.

In this, the sixth volume of The Speedicut Papers, the public will once again learn of further previously hidden truths that cast a new light on real historical incidents, set against the major events of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Although the first seven volumes of The Speedicut Papers were originally published in letter format, in response to popular demand I have re-edited the books into a narrative text. As with the previously published work, in the interests of clarity I have annotated the text with dates and historical or explanatory background material.

CHRISTOPHER JOLL

www.jasperspeedicut.com

Vitai Lam pada

Theres a breathless hush in the Close to-n ight

Ten to make and the match to win

A bumping pitch and a blinding l ight,

An hour to play and the last ma n in.

And its not for the sake of a ribboned coat,

Or the selfish hope of a seasons fame,

But his Captains hand on his shoulder s mote

Play up! Play up! And play the game!

The sand of the desert is sodden red,

Red with the wreck of a square that b roke;

The Gatlings jammed and the Colonel dead,

And the Regiment blind with dust and s moke.

The river of death has brimmed his b anks,

And Englands far, and Honour a name,

But the voice of a schoolboy rallies the r anks:

Play up! Play up! And play the game!

This is the word that year by year,

While in her place the School is set,

Every one of her sons must hear,

And none that hears it dare fo rget.

This they all with a joyful mind

Bear through life like a torch in f lame,

And falling fling to the host be hind

Play up! Play up! And play the game!

Sir Henry Newbolt (1862-1938)

Editors Note: Aficionados of the 19th Century poems of Empire will be aware that a square that broke refers to the Battle of Abu Klea in 1885, a battle that Speedicut records in Book 7 . However, I have taken the view that, in its more generic context, Vitai Lampada embodies the spirit of many of Speedicuts adventures related in the pages that fo llow.

PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS IN
ORDER OF APPEARANCE

Any similarity to persons now dead is entirely intenti onal

Jasper Speedicut an officer and a gentleman, usually known as Speed

Harry Flashman a remittance man mostly based in Paris, who is a friend of Speedicut and his controller in The Brotherhood of the Sons of Thunder, usually known as Flashy